1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a printing apparatus, a printing control method, and a program.
2. Description of the Related Art
In printing apparatuses, a printing failure such as shifting of a printing position, density unevenness, or stain sticking may occur. For example, in an electrophotographic printing apparatus, when a trouble occurs during a process of forming, transferring or fixing a toner image, a printing failure such as density unevenness, stain sticking, or a streak, a flaw or blurring on a sheet occurs. In the case of printing of print data including a color gamut near a boundary of a support range of the printing apparatus, density unevenness may occur depending on a state of the printing apparatus. If printing is continued in such a state of a printing failure, resources are wastefully consumed.
To inspect such a printing failure, there is an inspection apparatus that reads a printed image by a line sensor (e.g., a camera), and compares the read image with an image to be originally printed to measure a difference. The inspection apparatus uses a method for determining “occurrence of printing failure” if there is a predetermined difference between both images and then canceling sheet feeding and printing.
Japanese Patent Application Laid-Open No. 2010-42601 discusses a technique for canceling, to perform appropriate printing control for a printing failure, sheet feeding when the printing failure is detected, detecting printing failures of residual sheets, and performing automatic cleaning/adjustment when a detection value is equal to or more than a predetermined reference value to resume printing. The technique discussed in Japanese Patent Application Laid-Open No. 2010-42601 issues, when printing failures are detected on a predetermined number of sheets after the automatic cleaning/adjustment, a warning to an operator to stop the printing apparatus.
To reduce wasteful consumption of resources, a user can use a method for detecting a defect in a printed product and canceling printing when a printing failure is detected. However, in the case of a job including a great volume of pages such as a variable data printing (VDP) job, cancellation of printing for each detected defect deteriorates the production efficiency. Further, if the printing is immediately canceled, no solution to periodically occurring failures (drum flaws) can be provided to the user.
A method for canceling printing when printing failures reach a predetermined number or more can prevent the deterioration of the production efficiency caused by frequent cancellation. However, this method permits outputting of wasteful printed products including defects. In the case of variable printing, contents differ from one page to another. However, in some pages, the same object may be used. When the object includes a cause of a printing failure, there is a high possibility of occurrence of the printing failure in the other pages that use the object, so that it needs to cancel the printing. However, a possibility of the printing failure is low in pages that do not include the object. Thus, the continued printing may improve the productivity.